Care staff at Country Side Living have learned they will be receiving critical personal protective equipment, or PPE, from the Oregon National Guard this week, to help protect themselves and residents from further spread of the novel coronavirus at the site of Canby’s first confirmed outbreak.
At the direction of Governor Kate Brown, Guard members have been distributing hundreds of thousands of pieces of PPE to Oregon’s care homes, where the majority of the state’s COVID-related deaths have occurred thus far.
Country Side Human Resources Manager Michele Quinn told the Canby Now Podcast on Monday that the facility had had difficulty acquiring some forms of PPE — particularly the N95 respirators that are far more effective at filtering airborne pathogens and other contagions — before their first case of the new coronavirus was confirmed in a resident Sunday morning.
“We received confirmation from the National Guard that we will be receiving PPE from them this week,” Quinn said. “I know there has been a lot of coverage of them delivering to care facilities around the state and people were interested in knowing if we were in line for that as well.”
Quinn said the facility has also learned of an additional confirmed positive in a staff member, raising the total to five: three residents and two employees. The Canby Now Podcast asked her a question we’ve been asked multiple times in the past 24 hours: What, if anything can the community do to help?
“At this point, we are just in awe of the love and support received by the community,” she said. “The greatest need I could give you is anything at all that people might want to do to show appreciation for our staff. We are so humbled by their dedication and grateful more than ever for the care they give our residents! They are truly the shining stars in this dark situation.”